Contents

Alt.religion.scientology Week in Review summarizes the most significant
postings from the Usenet group Alt.religion.scientology for the preceding
week for the benefit of those who can't follow the group as closely as
they'd like. Out of thousands of postings, I attempt to include news of
significant events, new affidavits, court rulings, new contributors,
whatever. I hope you find it useful. Like many readers of a.r.s, I have a
kill file. So please take into consideration that I may not have seen some
of the most significant postings.

The articles in A.r.s Week in Review are brief summaries of the articles.
Many include an excerpt, and all include message IDs for the articles I
cover. This may or may not be useful to you, depending on how long your
site stores articles in the newsgroup before expiring them.

A.r.s Week in Review is available free, by e-mail and is archived at
http://amazing.cinenet.net/scientology.html

It was reported this week that "A Piece of Blue Sky" was banned in
Britain. This report was quickly followed by the following correction.

"This is not, in fact, the case, and "Piece of Blue Sky" continues to be
available [...]. The rumour has arisen out of a court judgement awarded
against Atack in a case brought by one Margaret Hodkyn, headmistress of
the Greenfield School, the Scientology school in East Grinstead, Sussex,
UK, which ordered the removal of a paragraph included in the book:
specifically, the court ordered that no copies of the book containing a
specific paragraph (first para, page 336 in the US edition) may be
distributed in the UK."

The paragraph in question was posted to the group several times this week.

"The head of the Scientology school in East Grinstead was being called as
a witness She denied that a twelve-year-old girl had received a "withhold
pulling session" at the hand of three of the school's staff To "pull
withholds" is Scientologese for making someone confess to their
transgressions. Minutes of the school's boards meetings had to be
publically available, yet the filed copy made no reference to the
"withhold-pulling" session. I obtained an _unedited_ copy of the school's
board minutes, which not only proved the headmistress's sworn statement
untrue, but showed the school's attempt at concealment."

It was reported this week that the cos legal team deposed Dennis Erlich
recently. The legal team of Moxon and Kobrin, and recent deposed Warren
McShane were in attendance. Dennis described the action.

"Moxon, The Glib, signed on the case and did some of the last questions.
The scienos are big on passing notes amongst themselves during depos.
Grinning and groaning, Moxon and McShame spent most of the depo
congratulating themselves with nods and smug smiles, and generally
behaving like the pompous *sses they are."

The deposition (http://www.eff.org/pub/EFF/Legal/Cases/CoS_v_the_Net/erlich_031495.declaration) should be posted soon.

"Over the past week, some concern has been raised regarding the Electronic
Frontier Foundation's (EFF's) tax status and our maintenance of the Dennis
Erlich Defense Fund. [...] However, in order to avoid further confusion
and to ensure the security of the fund, EFF has arranged to transfer its
maintenance to Mr. Erlich's attorneys."

This led several a.r.s regulars to conclude that recent postings from Vera
Wallace led to the transfer. Stanton McCandlish disagreed with Ms.
Steele's explanation, saying:

"EFF transferred the fund to MoFo, because it simply makes sense to do so.
We don't have the staff time or facilities to handle things like wire
transfer (and there are also legal reasons for not doing so, which I won't
go into), foreign-currency checks, etc. All we could take was US checks
and money orders. Our handling of the fund also resulted in an
unnecessary delay. As the money was going to MoFo anyway, it was simply
inefficient. The sole benefit of having EFF do the fund is that people
noticed - it was a name recognition thing. You all know we supported
Dennis and still do, so that benefit still adheres."

As long as the EFF continues to support Dennis' case, and not just Tom and
Netcom, I'll not complain.

Grady Ward reported this week that Eugene Ingram returned, by mail, the
photographs stolen from his mother last week. Mrs. Ward apparently will
continue her complaint against Ingram.

"Since the postmark of the envelope (no return address) contains a
postmark from *Portland, OR* (last three digits 721), the fraud becomes
the *federal* crime of interstate transportation of stolen property, a
base offense crime of 4 with a lot of possible sentencing 'enhancements'
depending upon value and other coeval acts."

An anonymous poster reported being assaulted at the recent 40th
Anniversary being held at the New York Sheraton. He was refused entry to
the event, and told to leave the hotel entirely. The poster described what
happened on the street.

"One of these 'security guards' approached me from behind and asked me to
wait a second. Still thinking this was a hotel security guard, and not a
Scientologist, I politely stopped and asked if there was a problem. Before
I could blink I was surrounded. 'We have to take your picture. You can't
leave until we take your picture.'

"'Yeah, right," said I. 'See, ya!' And I turned to walk away, only to find
a hand on my wrist. 'Hey,' I yelled. 'You are NOT a police officer! You
have no right to hold me!' Suddenly, I am covered with hands- at least
five people grabbing at me. And then a big burly guy comes right at me
from the front, and grabs me by the collar, yelling, 'Don't try raising
your voice to attract attention' or something to that affect, 'we won't
let you make a commotion here!'

"Why, naturally, I raised my voice and started making a commotion!
Instantly, there is a crowd of bystanders, watching with dropped jaw as I
scream, 'Call the police! Somebody call the police!' The crowd never
moved. I screamed some more, 'Call the police! I'm being assaulted!
Somebody help!' The crowd was frozen, and I start thinking about Kitty
Genovese. 'Help! Don't be fooled by their uniforms and badges, these
guys are NOT real police officers! I need the New York City Police!
Somebody call them! HELLLLLLLLLLLLP!!!!!!'

"Finally, Mr. Big 'n' Burly says, 'If you come back to this hotel I will
BUST YOUR HEAD IN!!!'---exact quote! He followed it up with, 'Do you
understand?'--repeated several times, as per the Success Through
Communications Course. After trying to no-answer him several times, I
finally said, 'Yes, I understand.' That was apparently the right answer,
and I was set free.

The NYPD later explained that this type of harassment cannot be pursued
unless a police officer witnesses the event.

KSW, Keep Scientology Working, recently published an article about the
Dennis Erlich case. Photos from the raid were included. As with the
Freedom issue, the name "alt.religion.scientology" was not mentioned, but
the language and spin of the article are very different.

"The infringer in this case was tracked down, and RTC discovered it to be
an individual who was declared more than a decade earlier for psychotic
and violent behavior, and partaking in a failed power push. Further
investigation uncovered his full criminal background which includes
physically abusing associates and family, and even failing to provide
child support (known as a 'deadbeat dad'). Finally, investigation revealed
that this individual is practically devoid of even a single friend and so
he joined the Cult Awareness Network (CAN), the only group who would have
him. CAN is an anti-religious hate group working to undermine and destroy
the very principles on which the United States of America was founded.
Many of its most prominent members were arrested and/or went to jail in
1994 for criminal and violent conduct.

"As electronic infringement on the copyrights of thousands of different
individuals and companies has become increasingly explosive, the courts
are clamping down on abusers. To date many of the foremost experts in this
field have joined forces with us to stamp out this abuse and get ethics in
on this area. So, through such actions, RTC is in the vanguard of
protecting the rights of many. But most importantly, through diligently
safeguarding the religious marks and materials, the tech is being kept
pure and ethics is going in on the SPs.